Written By prayudi syamsa on Selasa, 03 Maret 2015 | 11.46

Fears for Canadian pastor missing in North Korea

A Canadian pastor who has reportedly gone missing in North Korea was invited to the capital Pyongyang just before his disappearance, a prominent Seoul activist said on Tuesday. Reverend Hyeon Soo Lim, of the Light Korean Presbyterian Church in Toronto, has not been heard from since January 31, just after he arrived in North Korea via China, according to media reports in Canada and South Korea. Reverend Chun Ki-Won, the director of Durihana, a South Korean Christian missionary organisation helping North Korean refugees, said Lim was one of the most influential Christian missionaries operating in the North. The 60-year-old Lim had led many aid missions there involving work with orphanage houses, nursing homes and food plants, the reverend said.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Senin, 02 Maret 2015 | 11.46

'Jihadi John' part of network linked to failed London bombers - court papers

By Andrew Osborn LONDON (Reuters) - Islamist militant Mohammed Emwazi, identified as 'Jihadi John', was a member of a network in contact with one of the men convicted of trying to bomb the British capital's underground railway in 2005, according to the government. U.S. security sources last week identified the man, who appeared clad in black and brandishing a knife, as Mohammed Emwazi. The British government's view is set out in court papers, reviewed by Reuters and publicly available on the Internet, which refer to 2011 and 2013 British legal hearings concerning two of Emwazi's London associates, known only as Iranian-born "CE" and Ethiopian-born "J1." The court papers reported in the Observer and Sunday Telegraph newspapers, offer a fleeting glimpse of Emwazi's life in London before he left for Syria. One of the same network's members, "J1", spoke on the phone with Hussain Osman, one of the men convicted in connection with an unsuccessful attempt to blow up the London underground in 2005, on the day of the failed attack itself, the papers show.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Minggu, 01 Maret 2015 | 11.46

'Jihadi John' contemplated suicide in 2010: report

The London man believed to be Islamic State executioner "Jihadi John" told a journalist four years ago that surveillance by British security services had left him contemplating suicide, it emerged Saturday. Mohammed Emwazi, named by media and experts as the militant thought to have beheaded at least five Western hostages held by the IS group, told the Mail on Sunday reporter that he felt like a "dead man walking". Prime Minister David Cameron and a former head of foreign spy agency MI6 strongly rejected the idea, while London mayor Boris Johnson accused Cage of an "apology for terror". In an email to Mail on Sunday reporter Robert Verkaik, dated December 14, 2010, Emwazi described how he sold his laptop to someone he met online who he subsequently came to believe was with the security services.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Sabtu, 28 Februari 2015 | 11.46

Mexico captures Knights Templar drug cartel leader

Mexican police captured most-wanted drug lord Servando Gomez, a former schoolteacher whose Knights Templar cartel tormented western Michoacan state, smuggled drugs to the US and illegally shipped iron ore to China. The man nicknamed "La Tuta" was detained by federal officers without a shot fired as he exited a house in Morelia, Michoacan's capital, following months of intelligence work, officials said. Gomez, 49, was taken to Mexico City and frogmarched in front of television cameras, wearing a black sweater and jeans as two masked federal police officers held him down by the neck and led him into a helicopter. The balding, goateed kingpin had eluded authorities last year despite a massive manhunt in the mountains of Michoacan with help from a "rural defense" force comprised of former vigilantes, who had taken up arms against the Knights Templar.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Jumat, 27 Februari 2015 | 11.47

China bans ivory carving imports for one year

Beijing has imposed a one-year ban on the import of ivory carvings, amid international criticism that rapidly-growing Chinese demand could push wild African elephants to extinction within a generation. The move, which took effect Thursday, was announced by China's State Forestry Administration in a statement posted on its website. It comes days ahead of a visit to China by Britain's Prince William, who has campaigned against illegal wildlife trafficking. China is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, but regulated sales of ivory carvings are legal in the country.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Kamis, 26 Februari 2015 | 11.46

Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew still in intensive care-statement

Singapore's first prime minister and the man widely credited with the city-state's economic success, Lee Kuan Yew, is still on mechanical ventilation in an intensive care unit in hospital, the prime minister's office said on Thursday. Lee, who turned 91 last September, was admitted to hospital on Feb. 5 with severe pneumonia. Although Lee has receded from the public and political scene, his health is watched closely as he is still seen as an influential figure for the government of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, his oldest son. Lee, a Cambridge-educated lawyer, is widely credited with building Singapore into one of the world's wealthiest nations on a per capita basis with a strong, pervasive role for the state and little patience for dissent.

Written By prayudi syamsa on Rabu, 25 Februari 2015 | 11.46

Clinically depressed three times more likely to commit violent crime

By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - People diagnosed with major depression are around three times more likely than the general population to commit violent crimes such as robbery, sexual offences and assault, psychiatric experts said on Wednesday. "One important finding was that the vast majority of depressed persons were not convicted of violent crimes, and that the rates ... are below those for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and considerably lower than for alcohol or drug abuse," said Seena Fazel, who led the study at Oxford University's psychiatry department. Andrea Cipriani, a clinical researcher and consultant psychiatrist at Oxford who was not directly involved in the study, said the results show how important it is to talk directly to depressed patients about how violent thoughts and behaviour can be part of their illness. Fazel's team, whose work was published in The Lancet Psychiatry journal, tracked medical and crime records of 47,158 people in Sweden diagnosed with depression and compared them with 898,454 non-depressed people matched for age and gender.